


Be Here Now

by BlackMamba



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Character of Color, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-30
Updated: 2009-12-30
Packaged: 2017-10-05 11:47:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/41440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlackMamba/pseuds/BlackMamba
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cassie doesn't see the thing that kills her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Be Here Now

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tokenblkgirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tokenblkgirl/gifts).



> A/N: Gift!fic for who wanted SPN-Cassie Robinson/John Winchester-a post Dean-relationship angst fic. She's also an awesome beta :)

Cassie doesn't see the thing that kills her. That's the worse part, even more than the pain or those last few moments of silence before the edges of the world cave in. It's like trying to remember a name that just slips away (Vampire? Demon? Did something stab her?).

She goes back at first. There's her seventh birthday with the blue and white cake. There's her first high school dance, a fifties theme sock hop where all the girls dressed in fitted sweaters and saddle shoes. There's her Dad's last Christmas, when he'd guessed every single present under the tree. There's Dean. There's her favorite movie, _An Affair to Remember_, that she watched so many times she became Terry McKay.

And then she stops. It isn't a conscious decision (she isn't sure she has those anymore) but time has stopped playing in a loop and she is standing in front of a diner in a town she's never been before. She wonders if this is what comes next, the after part of afterlife, though she hopes (maybe she can still do that) her first view of heaven won't be through the greasy window of a diner named "Joe's."

\--

John never looks for company. That's not really what you do here; troll around for warm willing bodies or a buddy to shoot the shit with. He goes back sometimes, to his house, to Mary, to his boys before he broke them, even to Bobby just to feel like he's in it again. Other than that, it's neutral territory, random memories of nameless towns with motels or restaurants that stay with him.

He tries to ignore the newbies or puppies as he thinks of them. You can always spot them, wagging their tale at anything familiar. Their favorite burrito's on the menu or cousin Al strolls by and it's like they've won the lottery, never mind that Al can't see them or that those beans and rice are just an echo, the ghost of what your mouth remembers. But eventually they get past it and start to wonder what comes next.

Cassie isn't a puppy. She doesn't walk into the diner with wide eyes, still trying to figure out if she's trapped in an elaborate dream or the worse acid trip she's ever experienced. She's more curious than anything, staring at faces as though trying to see through the people in the booths instead of waiting for them to speak to her. And when her eyes fall on John she doesn't call his name, even though he can tell she's recognized him, probably from one of Dean's pictures. She walks to his table and stops a few inches from the Formica edge.

"So you're here too."

\--

John says Dean talked about her, which is surprising. Cassie's dated her fair share of mumbling rebels and the last thing they tend to talk about is the girl that got away, the one that made them feel more like a fool than an irresistible stud that refused to be tied down. "It wasn't much," John says. "Just your name and a picture he had in his wallet."

"Dean had a picture of me?" Cassie thinks back to the time they'd spent together. There were no cameras involved, as he tended to avoid them altogether. Now she realizes that having pictures lying around when every demon in hell wants to kill you probably isn't the best idea. Maybe that's what happened; some demon was looking for Dean and thought he'd use her to send a message. "He must have taken it from my dresser."

There is a milkshake in front of her, strawberry, her favorite. She lifts the straw and stirs it. The consistency is perfect. "What is this place?"

"Joe's." John picks up a French fry. "One of my favorite restaurants."

"Your favorite?" She looks around the room. "So this is your memory?"

"Yeah."

"How did I end up here?"

John's expression is guarded. She remembers what Dean said about his father and secrets, that John Winchester could know how the world would end but wouldn't see the point in telling anyone unless he could do something about it. "I'm not sure," he says. "Maybe you were lonely."

"Lonely?" She smiles. "Does that still happen?"

John nods. "A lot of things still happen Cassie." He pushes the milkshake closer. "Drink that."

She starts to say she isn't hungry. Cassie's never liked being ordered around and his voice is a bit too close to Dean's for her comfort. But something stops her, his tone maybe. It makes his command to drink her shake feel a lot more like "here. Have the keys to the universe."

She takes a drink. It's good, probably the best she's ever had. But it's still just a milkshake. "Okay?" She shrugs. "It tastes like strawberries."

John smiles for the first time since she sat down in his booth. "Yeah; it still tastes like strawberries."

\--

It doesn't take John long to figure out why someone who could barely sit still long enough to get a hair cut would steal a picture of Cassie Robinson to keep. She's brave for one thing. When John tells her she's somewhere between heaven and hell, that it's his between, not her own, she takes it stride, asking questions instead of breaking down like others do.

She wants to know if it's all just memories or can they move forward as well as backwards. She wants to know how long he's been here, if they'll eventually move on, and if so when? John answers what he can (no, it isn't just memories and yes, they can move forward) but avoids or lies about the rest. He says he doesn't know how long he's been there (he can count the days, right down to the minutes). He says that moving on is up to a higher power, when it's really up to her. But he doesn't know what piece she's missing, the thing she's supposed to face before she does. He can't find it for her anyway.

She's comfortable with him, more so than anyone he's met in a long time, maybe Mary. Most people can tell he isn't right, that there's some dark shit in there and he's someone to be avoided. But if Cassie notices she doesn't seem to care. He asks her where she wants to go and she chooses his favorite place.

"My favorite place?"

"The one that made you happy," she says, like it's an address on a map. He doesn't have to think hard about it though. He's been there a few times himself recently. One minute they're standing in the parking lot of Joe's diner and the next they're on a football field, staring at empty bleachers.

"High school?" She turns around with a soft laugh. "You're one of _those_ guys?"

\--

The world is on fire. It lights the sky with sparks of red and gold, black smoke billowing in thick clouds, winding away into the distance. Cassie listens to the symphony of screams with a sadness that made her bones ache. She doesn't realize she's crying until John wipes away a tear.

"Don't do that." She steps away from his hand. "Don't baby me."

"I'm not-"

"Yes you are." The fire retreats, the bottom caving like it's taking a deep breath. It exhales with an explosion, orange fingers reaching out to grab what's left of the town. "So this is what it's like now?"

John looks up at the sky, watches the smoke spiraling overhead.

"Sometimes."

\--

She's been with him a week before he lets her see the house.

The day he picks is a good one, when he fixed the wobbly chair Mary kept complaining about and Dean took it upon himself to wash the dishes without anyone asking. Dinner was meatloaf because his wife thought her boys deserved a good meal and they laughed about how no one had to sit in "The Chair of Doom," anymore with their weight shifted to one side.

"She's beautiful." Cassie stares at Mary. He'd been sure she would focus on Dean, the miniature version of the man she loved and lost. But instead she watches his wife move around the kitchen, serving them with skillful, nimble hands. "You must have loved her so much."

John stares at Mary's back, the small crease at the bottom of her shirt where it was tucked into her jeans. He watches her slice a piece of cake, the way she holds the blade, fingers cradling the bottom so she can twist it with a flick of her wrist. That's how you keep the wound from closing.

"I didn't know her."

\--

Sometimes he reminds her of Dean. He'll laugh like him; the slope of their shoulders is identical. She'll stare at his back and think _ah, I know that back. I've dragged my nails across that back_, that's how similar they are. And he talks about him, all the time, because it's the thing they share, loving his oldest boy. But after a while that tapers off into the odd mention now and then. And Cassie starts to pick apart the things that are different.

John is patient. Maybe it's his age or the fact that he has an eternity to wait, but he never rushes her, never makes those little grunting "how long is this shit gonna take," noises. Aside from a few false starts in the beginning, he's not condescending, doesn't treat her like a petulant little girl he has to babysit until something takes her off his hands. And she doesn't mind when he tells her what to do, that she shouldn't worry about things she can't change and that there's no use in asking questions that have no answers. It's comforting, being told that just existing is okay.

She starts to think of him as hers. That the reason she's here, traipsing through his memories is so they can be hers too.

\--

John didn't think he had a type when he was alive other than willing and semi-sober, the latter being negotiable when he was shitfaced himself. But if he did, he's sure it would have been her. It's that half smile, like she has the sexiest secret you'll never hear. It the way she trusts him. It's the sound of her voice, a slightly hoarse thing as if she's just finished off her last cigarette.

He doesn't feel guilty. He'd like to think it's a side effect of dying, one-hundred years of brimstone topped off with these last few spent roaming around like Casper, but it isn't. Of the few things he gave a shit about when he was alive, _hands off your son's girl_, wasn't one of them. That's a father's rule, something to give an insurance salesman pause at the bar Saturday night. What he did was largely maintenance, that and slap on a few abandonment issues for good measure.

"If you could do it over would you?"

She's grown bold enough to ask him this question. John leans back against the hood of his car, Dean's car to her.

"I wouldn't know how to change it."

\--

He looks at her like they've been fucking for years and she's just forgotten. Cassie isn't sure he's even aware of it, the way his eyes fall randomly on her body, her shoulder, her leg, the crook of her elbow, as though he's memorizing a map. She doesn't mention it because she's terrified he'll stop. Sex is something she relished when she was alive, which led to a fair amount of partners with fuzzy last names, a few that, if she's honest, she's probably forgotten on purpose.

When she was younger it was tattoos and motorcycles, a James Dean pout and propensity for self-destruction. As she got older, the tattoos seized to impress and riding on the back of bike with bugs flying up her nose lost its allure. But the self-destruction part lingered, along with a new appreciation for guns and restlessness. The gun part was self explanatory, but riding some drifter, a man with one foot out the door felt like slaying a dragon, sipping some illicit wine that would dry up as soon as you put down the glass.

Even here, John is slippery, tenuous, always in the past and present, never once mentioning the future. And sometimes, when he goes quiet, settles into whatever booth they've confiscated for dinner, she'll ask him what he's thinking. Sometimes he'll answer but for the most part it's a cryptic "nothing."

And then one night she tells him, sitting in the back seat of the Impala, curled up inside the crook of his arm; that she misses being touched, the feel of a man inside her. Not with words. She still gets tongue tied with that sort of thing, but with a hand on his leg, her fingers drifting, curling slightly inward in a silent _now? I can't wait any longer_.

John presses his lips against her temple, not so much kissing as resting them there, his breath warm on her skin. He inhales deeply. The sound, loud in the silent car, is his answer.

_I don't think I can either._

\--

It occurs to him as Cassie is grinding against his cock, legs dangling on either side of his thighs, bare breasts swaying in front of him, that he's never asked how old she is. They're still dressed for the most part, his shirt unfastened, hers shoved high up on her chest, but the sight of them standing at attention with no support, her nipples puckered from a flick of his thumb, makes him wonder if she made it past thirty. Hell, she could be younger than Sam for all he knows, a college co-ed with a nineteen-eighty-something birthday and two years of legal drinking under her belt before it all ended. He's old enough to be her father.

The thought makes him harder and he wonders how many guys she's been with, rabbit fucking little assholes who grimaced at the thought of going down on her. That's why they're here, the first place he could think of with a bed. He outgrew backseats a long time ago and he's not going to waste this on frantic fumbling and leg cramps.

"Come here."

He kisses her, tongue fucks her mouth until she's groaning, grinding harder. John palms her breasts pinches her nipples, hard enough to make her wince. It's a test, to see if it's what she wants (because he sure as fuck does) and she passes. She trembles, her rocking a little more frantic. He takes one in his mouth, bites down hard. Cassie yells something unintelligible and pushes his face against her breast. She begs him to do it again.

Her body feels like energy, a heated conduit, which seems fitting since they're both just displaced souls. But she's also real. He touches her and she feels alive, pulse racing, skin salty with sweat. Her mouth is mint toothpaste and the bitter beer they had with dinner.

"Take it off." John watches her stand. She reaches for her jeans and unfastens them quickly. He touches her hand. "Slower," he says, _demands_. "I want to watch you."

He doesn't know how long it's been since he's watched a woman undress. A new one, not the old one-night stands he avoids now. The sight of his drunken come-on's are embarrassing. But this, smooth brown skin revealed inch by inch, a pair of virginal white panties, boy shorts that cling to her thighs on the way down, this is something else entirely.

\--

This is her memory.

Cassie can tell by the street signs, the words "Park Avenue," and "Broadway," peeling at the corners, the way they had been the day she died. John is behind her, silent, knowing too much like always.

"Why are we here?"

He doesn't have time to answer. She sees herself, her Chevy sputtering towards the intersection. The engine makes a loud popping sound and she pulls over, parks on the side of the road.

She knows this day. She's still wearing those jeans and that blouse. She knows what song her mirror image is listening to, "Paint It Black," on one of those classic rock stations. The hood pops with a metallic clang and the driver's side door swings open, the last notes of the song briefly audible before she shuts it.

"Why now?" Cassie looks at John, who stares past her, at the other her, the one that's taking her last few breaths. "Why are we here now?"

He reaches for her hand. "I'm sorry Cassie."

Tires squeal on the pavement. Cassie turns in time to see a grey sedan slam on its breaks, the front bumper crumpled and splattered with red, like someone has thrown a bucket of paint in its path. She sees legs, her own legs, lying just visible behind the right wheel. Not a vampire or a demon, not even some crazed zealot waving an axe around in the name of the apocalypse. It's just a car, some drunken asshole that stumbles out and cries while she's lying there dying. Two minutes longer at the gas station and she never would have been here at all.

"What's the point of all this?"

Cassie drops his hand. John steps back and she turns to meet his eyes.

"Why do we even bother?"

\--

John sits in a booth nursing a cup of coffee. The seat across from him is empty and the weight of it is heavy, suffocating. A man approaches the table, thin and blond, his skin peeling away like dry rot. John looks away, at the parking lot visible outside the dingy windows.

"You're not speaking to me now?" Lucifer slides into the booth. John picks up his coffee and takes a drink.

"Nothing to say."

"I find that hard to believe." Lucifer's eyes are narrowed with genuine concern. "You have to know you couldn't keep her."

"I wasn't trying to." The coffee is cold and John shoves it to the edge of the table. He keeps his eyes averted, tries not the think of the man he's wearing. "Why'd you do it?"

Lucifer leans forward and waits for John to meet his eyes.

"So you'd remember what it's like."


End file.
